


Lift Off

by sweatypalms (thewalkingdreads)



Category: Interstellar (2014)
Genre: Countdown, Endurance - Freeform, Father/Daughter, Gen, blast-off, cries a lot, leaving Earth, omg Cooper, omg Murphy, so much feel, space
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-11-27
Updated: 2014-11-27
Packaged: 2018-02-27 05:14:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 931
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2680433
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thewalkingdreads/pseuds/sweatypalms
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A quick little narration of the lift-off sequence in the movie, Interstellar. Told in 3rd Person from Cooper's perspective.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Lift Off

**Author's Note:**

> First of all, I'd like to express how much I love Interstellar. This movie seriously impacted me in many, many ways. I watched it for the first time two weeks ago, and I still can't stop thinking about it. The story and characters and music and visuals and science and virtually everything about Interstellar made it the best movie I've ever seen. The emotions were so rich that I was in tears at times, to be honest. I'm not sure how to explain it, but this movie really...defined(?) me. It told a story that seemed to be made for me, is what I guess I'm trying to say..?  
> Anyways, yeah. Just...yeah.  
> Ever since I watched Interstellar, I've been itching to make a tribute to it. So I wrote this short piece to give a little back to the movie. This piece isn't super fleshed out and dissected and thought out like all of my other writing, and it'll probably go through a lot of changes. What I describe as Cooper's thoughts are probably far from what actually goes on in his mind at this point in the movie. And this isn't intended to present what I think his thoughts would be. (In fact, this hardly is what I think his thoughts would be at all.) So this piece, at its core, is really just experimental. I hope you enjoy reading it.

_TEN._

 

Cooper heard TARS slowly count the numbers away. Painfully slowly. They ticked away to the beat of his heart—which should’ve been pounding maddeningly at this point and time in space. But it remained slow. Everything was slow. Perhaps for Cooper, time was already dilating.

 

 _NINE_.

 

Deep down Cooper wanted to turn the ship upside-down, and let the engines dig its way into the Earth that he—no, _everyone_ —learned to call home. The only home mankind ever had. That way he could never leave. But the Earth itself wasn’t why he wanted to stay. Earth was falling into an Age of sterility. Harsh, malnourished, and dry. Earth, in all of its dying glory, had been telling humankind to leave for a while. What made Cooper want to stay was Murph. In their last tears and moments spent together, she begged him to S.T.A.Y. But his mind was already regrettably made. Cooper was going to leave his little girl behind, quite possibly to never see her again. And for what, to colonize another planet? To save the future mankind? Why should he live to see mankind flourish, when it meant leaving his daughter to blossom on her own?

 

 _EIGHT_.

 

Murph’s smile flashed before Cooper’s eyes a million times in these first precious seconds. Her young, inquisitive, adventurous smile. How much he would miss seeing her right in front of him everyday, to greet him with that wonderful grin. But he left her in tears and remorse. Murph would grow old without him, the ends of her mouth drooping further and further until that young, inquisitive, and adventurous smile disappears into oblivion. Cooper bit his lips. He let the smallest trace of emotion seep between them, as all passengers of the Endurance were without a doubt feeling _something_ as well. But Cooper, he was feeling it the most. He took in a quick, unnecessary breath while he still could, before they left the atmosphere. He couldn’t think of Murph any further. Not if he wanted to live through this without a broken heart.

 

 _SEVEN_.

 

How could he possibly leave her? The empty sky before him gave no merciful reply—the only thing Cooper could gaze upon in his horizontally aligned chair. The sky was the most opened of arms, leading out into the vastness of infinity, with the only true obstacle being gravity. But gravity, as all scientists knew, was the weakest of forces within our four dimensions of spacetime. Nevertheless, gravity has trumped each and every one of those scientists both physically and mentally. Gravity was the one piece they could never fit quite right into the complex puzzle of astrophysics. Nothing transcended gravity without a fight. Not time, not even light.

 

 _SIX_.

 

Yes, let’s think of light. Anything to keep our minds off the astounding pressure about to be felt at the back of Cooper’s skull. Light was everywhere at this time in the universe. Each source trillions upon trillions of lightyears spread apart, dispersed, isolated, alone, and quite possibly never able to reach one another due to the ever-quickening, faster-than-the-speed-of-light expansion of the fabric of space itself. But everywhere all the same. Let’s not mind the infinite darkness in between. That darkness only matters if one lets it matter. So Cooper dismissed it as calmly as possible, setting the mission controls in the most detached, robotic manner as possible. Maybe even more so than TARS could have. TARS came with a personality after all. Could you Imagine that? A robot with personality. And with more so than half the people on Earth Cooper was obligated to save.

 

 _FIVE_.

No, not just their lives. Cooper was leaving to save Murph’s, too. Without a sustainable food source and clean air to breathe, Murphy would eventually starve and—god forbid—die. Cooper couldn’t stand the thought. He could hardly to begin imagining it; how could anyone expect him to let it _actually happen_? NASA needed a pilot, and Cooper was the only one who’d flown outside the simulator. He was experienced, resourceful, and efficient. To anyone else, saving mankind would be the only priority. But Cooper, in all his reluctant certainty, ultimately decided he was leaving Earth to save her life, and quite selfishly, her life only. Ensuring the future of humanity only mattered to him because it also meant ensuring his daughter’s survival.

 

 _FOUR_.

 

There Cooper was, thinking about Murphy again. Instead of preparing his mind for the long trip ahead, he was already reminiscing on the past he was about to leave behind. Murphy would be waiting. And as far as Cooper could tell, she’d be waiting _years_ for him to return. It pained him indefinitely to think of the risks, but at least Cooper was able to tell her how much he loved her before he left the house in his blue truck. That much he could be at peace with. As for the rest of himself...well, he’d just have to hope and wait and see.

 

 _THREE_.

 

But Cooper would make it back—that much he knew. If it meant holding Murphy again, if it meant seeing her smile just once more so he could wipe her tears away forever, then he would gladly cross the entire universe and back. He would tear holes into the very fabric of space and time; if it meant holding Murphy again.

 

_TWO._

 

No matter how great the length, how daunting the challenge, or how incredibly dark and empty, he would _have_ to make it back.

  


_ONE_.

 

For the pilot promised his little girl he would.

 

_LIFT OFF––_

 

 


End file.
